#FixTheCountryNow conveners to stage demo over hardships on May 9

Conveners of the #FixTheCountryNow social media protest have written to the Police to notify them of their intention to stage a protest over hardships in the country and the neglect of leadership.

They intend to hold the protest on May 9, 2021.

Social media personalities including Efia Odo, Comedian Warris, Speak Up Ghana, Gyai Gyimii amongst others have used the hashtag to call on government to attend to problems facing the country including the hike in fuel prices, poor education, health, infrastructure and ultimately the country’s economy, etc.

The online protest has been trending for the past 72 hours on micro-blogging platform Twitter.

The group in a notice to the Ghana Police Service over the planned protest said “the event, which is a single purpose event, is being organized on the back of a string of consistently broken promises by successive governments; and in the exercise of our democratic rights as citizens to express our frustration over perennial Governmental incompetence, refusal, and/or inability to fix the country."

It indicated the motivation for the organizers as “The Organizers believe, as does the President, that democracy is not a spectator sport. We are committed to improving the substance of governance in this country by ensuring that the ordinary voices of Ghanaians provide a mechanism to hold elected officials accountable. There comes a point where enough is enough. Just fix the country!!! That’s our only message. We have had it with purposeful deceit and the absence of truth and genuine accountability in how this country is being governed.”

The group explained that May 9 was chosen for two reasons “First, it captures the restless spirit of over 126 Ghanaians who lost their lives in the May 9th Accra Sports Stadium Disaster due to institutionalized incompetence and disregard for Ghanaian lives. Secondly, the Protest commemorates the 26th Anniversary of the Kume Preko Demonstration of 11 May 1995.”

“Thus, the event draws inspiration from the undying culture of protest and dissent that has forged our democracy, and which Kume Preko has become a synonym for in our collective memory.”

The proposed protest will see protestors walk from the Black Star Square Accra to Maxmart, 37.